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THE CHEF; A Crisp As Easy As Pie. No, Easier.

''YOU could make this dessert with your eyes closed,'' Rebecca Charles said as she stood in front of her Cuisinart processor making the crumbly topping for a blackberry nectarine crisp.

She very nearly did.

Ms. Charles dumped light brown sugar straight from the box into the bowl of the processor. Then she pulled a few handfuls of rolled oats from a can and scattered them on top of the brown sugar. All-purpose flour she shook directly from its white paper bag. ''This is one of those recipes you can fudge,'' she said. ''I like that kind of baking. I don't have a pastry chef here, so I can whip this one up quickly.''

It was sheer coincidence that Ms. Charles, the chef and owner of Pearl Oyster Bar, an outpost for Maine coastal cooking on Cornelia Street in Greenwich Village, had chosen to make a quick fudge-tolerant dessert on a chaotic day: several deliveries were three hours late and counting, and two repairmen were expected, but neither had shown up.

Ms. Charles dealt with those annoyances the way any home cook might. She put a jazzy CD on, poured herself another cup of coffee and set to work slicing and pitting the nectarines. ''I love this,'' she said as she picked up a knife and sliced into one, sunset orange and purply-red. ''This is my domain.''

When she had sliced three nectarines into inch-size pieces, she transferred them to a large stainless steel bowl. She dipped a half-cup measurer, the only measuring device to make an appearance as she made the dish, into a container of granulated sugar, swept the excess with her index finger, and showered the sugar evenly over the cut fruit.

She turned back to the ingredients in the food processor and added a pinch of salt to the bowl. ''Anytime there's sugar, you need a pinch of salt,'' she said, and pulsed the dry mixture a couple of times.

From an under-counter refrigerator, Ms. Charles pulled a pound block of butter. She ran her large chef's knife under hot water, and cut six tablespoons from it. ''The butter should be cold,'' she said, and began to slice it into small pieces with the knife.

''I use a hot knife, but I cut the butter quickly so it doesn't soften,'' she said, and scraped the pieces from the cutting board into the dry ingredients. ''You could make the topping by hand, but it's a lot easier to pulse in the processor. It's ready when it starts to be crumbly.''

After several pulses, the texture ranged from sand- to gravel-size clumps. But be careful, she advised: ''You can go too far with it, and it turns into a slag heap.''

''I forgot the cinnamon,'' she said, and she fetched the jar, added a few pinches and pulsed the mixture once again.

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Ms. Charles then upended a bottle of natural vanilla extract and, using her thumb as a stopper, shook a few drops over the nectarines. ''I love vanilla,'' she said. ''Usually we use vanilla beans, but this is quicker.'' She tossed the fruit with a large spoon and transferred it to a red ceramic oven-safe bowl she had smeared with a small knob of butter. ''I use more nectarines than blackberries because you're apt to find better nectarines,'' she said.

Then she opened a plastic container of large perfect blackberries and placed them one at a time on the surface of the nectarines. ''Use the blackberries more as an accent,'' she said. Having set aside the blade, she reached into the processor bowl, grabbed fistfuls of crumbly dough and scattered it over the fruit. ''The berries'll bleed out all this fabulous inky color,'' she said, setting it in the oven.

And then it was time. The plumber appeared, son in tow. And another man arrived to fix the brand-new fryer that had overflowed during service the night before. But by the time the dessert had emerged from the oven 45 minutes later, deep-purple syrup bubbling through holes in its crust, they had all gone, and the only ones left to sample the blackberry nectarine crisp were the two of us and a photographer.

1. Butter a 2-quart baking dish or six 8-ounce ramekins with 1 tablespoon butter. Heat oven to 375 degrees. In a food processor, pulse flour, oats, brown sugar, cinnamon and salt once or twice to mix. Cut remaining butter into small chunks, add to flour mixture and pulse a few more times, until mixture just comes together into small crumbly clumps. Reserve.

2. In a large bowl, combine nectarines, granulated sugar and vanilla. Pour nectarines into baking dish or ramekins, scatter blackberries on top and sprinkle with the processed mixture. Bake 45 minutes, until bubbling. Serve immediately with vanilla ice cream.